Best programming and hacker quotes. Ever.
Curated by fellow hackers Jarmo Pertman & Andri Möll
What I cannot build, I do not understand.
Richard Feynman
An ideal world is left as an exercise to the reader.
From Paul Graham's "On Lisp"
Interfaces keep things tidy, but don't accelerate growth: Functions do.
Alan J. Perlis
Giving up on assembly language was the apple in our Garden of Eden: Languages whose use squanders machine cycles are sinful. The LISP machine now permits LISP programmers to abandon bra and fig-leaf.
Alan J. Perlis
Any sufficiently advanced bug is indistinguishable from a feature.
Rich Kulawiec
Rules for optimization: 1. Don't do it. 2. (for experts only) Don't do it yet.
Michael A Jackson
When someone says "I want a programming language in which I need only say what I wish done," give him a lollipop.
Alan J. Perlis
Any problem in computer science can be solved with another layer of indirection. But that usually will create another problem.
David Wheeler
Optimization hinders evolution.
Alan J. Perlis
If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough.
Alan Kay